In our first storage test, we utilize a 3.82GB test folder and
transfer it from our WD VelociRaptor drive to the competing hard drives.

There is only a 2% difference in performance between the two
drives on the Intel P55 controller and basically a tie on the Marvell
controller. We did not expect anything
really different as the average sustained transfer rates between all three
drives are very close.

In our second storage test, we utilize the same 3.82GB
test folder and transfer it from our test hard drives to the Intel 160GB SSD.

The tables flip here
with the Seagate drive performing about 3% faster on the Intel controller than
the WD drive. However, Seagate drive is
12% faster in this test on the Intel P55 in 3Gb/s mode than at 6Gb/s mode on
the Marvell controller.

In our final small folder test, we utilize the 3.82GB
test folder and transfer it from our test SSD back to the competing hard drives.

We finally see the Marvell
9128 chipset making a difference. The
Seagate XT drive is 9% faster in 6Gb/s operation than in 3Gb/s mode on the
Intel P55. We noticed peak transfer
rates of 296MB/s on the Marvell controller compared to 262MB/s on the Intel
controller with the Seagate drive. In
both cases, the Seagate drive is faster in this test than the Western Digital
drive.

AnandTech Large Folder
Transfer Results –

In our first storage test, we utilize a 15.2GB test folder and
transfer it from our WD VelociRaptor drive to the competing hard drives.

Our two drives perform identically on like controllers, the only
difference here is that the Marvell controller is leading Intel in part to the
aggressive 1027 driver algorithms that utilize additional system memory for
transfer caching.

In our second storage test, we utilize the same 15.2GB
test folder and transfer it from our test hard drives to the Intel 160GB SSD.

Interestingly enough, the WD
drive is faster on the Marvell controller than the Intel. However, the Seagate drive benefits from the
Intel controller.

In our final large folder transfer test, we utilize the 15.2GB folder and transfer it from our test SSD back to the competing hard drives.

Like our small folder test,
we see the benefits of the Marvell Controller in SATA 6Gb/s mode as the Seagate
drive is 7% faster than it is in SATA 3Gb/s operation. The WD drive is up to 17% slower in this
particular test.

PCMark Vantage x64
Results –

We are showing the
total score for the PCMark Vantage disk benchmark as a reference point between
the two controllers and drives.

The Seagate XT drive in SATA 6Gb/s mode on the Marvell controller is
barely faster than SATA 3Gb/s mode on the Intel controller. The WD drive is just flat out faster in this
particular benchmark with the Intel controller being about 3% faster than the
Marvell controller.

Quick
Thoughts:

That was
a letdown in several ways. We never
really expected that much out of SATA 6Gb/s technology as our two hard drive
samples are just now pushing the boundaries of SATA 1.5Gb/s. Only when we utilized a fast SSD as the
source drive to copy files to the Seagate Barracuda XT did we see an advantage
in the burst rates available on it and the Marvell 9123 chipset. Even then, the advantage was fleeting as the
sustained transfer rates equalized quickly between the two controllers. This test is just the opposite of what a
typical user would perform anyway as most would utilize the hard drive for storage
purposes and not the SSD.

Even
more disturbing was the performance disparity between the Seagate Barracuda XT
2TB and the Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB drive in our limited benchmark
test suite. We expected more from the
Seagate drive based on its specifications, not the 6Gb/s abilities but platter
design and cache setups. Hopefully
Seagate can improve performance with firmware changes, if not; the battle is
already lost regardless of controller technology.

We just
do not see SATA 6Gb/s technology offering any real benefits for spindle-based
hard drives on the desktop at this time.
Rotational speeds are being kept in check at 7,200rpm with all the
performance improvements coming from increased areal densities and cache. We
expect SATA 6Gb/s to really come into its own with solid state drives. This will not occur quickly but we expect to
see recognizable benefits with controller designs about two generations ahead
of where we are currently. By that time,
both AMD and Intel will have native 6Gb/s capabilities on their controller
hubs.

In
the meantime, we see the current implementations of 6Gb/s technology on
motherboards as being a marketing checklist feature for the most part. However, since the Marvell 9123 chipset can
fall back to SATA 3Gb/s or 1.5Gb/s operational mode it does offer additional SATA
ports on the motherboard with performance that is fine for secondary storage
devices.

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56 Comments

I don't get it ! Who needs single drive over 1TB ? We all need a wide availability of affordable hardware RAID controllers. RAID6 array of say 8x500GB drives offers speed, reliability & capacity that no single drive can ever dream of. But please no more FakeRAID junk, please. Reply

Given what I know about harddrives, the above results are not terribly surprising. What limits the data bandwidth of a harddrive is the bottleneck between the harddrive controllers and the platters, which is much less than 3Gb/s. This is not going to change anytime soon for mechanical harddrives.

However, for SSDs, there is no such bottleneck. SSD's with SATA 6Gb/s is something more easily realized in the near future. Still, we are going to need to wait about 2 years for the appropriate SSD controllers, dedicated motherboard PCIe lanes, and cheaper faster flash memory, to be developed to allow this to happen.

Seagate has offered free data recovery on the disks that experienced this problem. There is also an easy fix although you have to either buy or make your own custom cable in order to unbrick the drive. Reply